Sullivan Ballou

Sullivan Ballou (28 March 1829-29 July 1861) was a Union Army major during the American Civil War who was killed at the First Battle of Bull Run.

Biography
Sullivan Ballou was born in Smithfield, Rhode Island in 1829, and he became a lawyer in 1853 and went on to be elected to the State House of Representatives in 1854 as a Republican. He was a staunch supporter of Abraham Lincoln, and he volunteered in the 2nd Rhode Island Infantry Regiment when the American Civil War broke out in 1861. On 14 July 1861, he wrote to his wife Sarah, expressing how he was ready to die for his country if it was God's plan, how American civilization leaned on the triumph of the government, expressed his deathless love for his wife, his irresistible love of his country which led him to the battlefield, and he asked his wife that, if he would not return, to forgive his many faults and pains, to remember how much he loved her, his desire to visit the earth after his death and always be with his wife, and then told her to not think of him gone, but anticipate meeting him again. A week later, his right leg was blown off and his horse killed by a Confederate cannonball at the First Battle of Bull Run, and he died of his wounds another week later.